Psalm 74

Common English Bible

Psalm 74

A maskil^[a] of Asaph.

74 God, why have you abandoned us forever?
    Why does your anger smolder
    at the sheep of your own pasture?
²Remember your congregation
    that you took as your own long ago,
    that you redeemed to be the tribe of your own possession—
    remember Mount Zion, where you dwell.
³March to the unending ruins,
    to all that the enemy destroyed in the sanctuary.

⁴Your enemies roared in your own meeting place;
    they set up their own signs there!
⁵It looked like axes raised
    against a thicket of trees.^[b]
⁶And then all its carvings
    they hacked down with hatchet and pick.
⁷They set fire to your sanctuary, burned it to the ground;
    they defiled the dwelling place of your name.
⁸They said in their hearts, We’ll kill all of them together!
    They burned all of God’s meeting places in the land.
⁹We don’t see our own signs anymore.
    No prophet is left.
        And none of us know how long it will last.

¹⁰How long, God, will foes insult you?
Are enemies going to abuse your name forever?
¹¹Why do you pull your hand back?
Why do you hold your strong hand close to your chest?

¹²Yet God has been my king from ancient days—
    God, who makes salvation happen in the heart of the earth!
¹³        You split the sea with your power.
        You shattered the heads of the sea monsters on the water.
¹⁴        You crushed Leviathan’s heads.
        You gave it to the desert dwellers for food!
¹⁵        You split open springs and streams;
        you made strong-flowing rivers dry right up.
¹⁶        The day belongs to you! The night too!
        You established both the moon and the sun.
¹⁷        You set all the boundaries of the earth in place.
        Summer and winter? You made them!

¹⁸So remember this, Lord:
    how enemies have insulted you,
    how unbelieving fools have abused your name.
¹⁹Don’t deliver the life of your dove to wild animals!
    Don’t forget the lives of your afflicted people forever!
²⁰Consider the covenant!
    Because the land’s dark places are full of violence.
²¹Don’t let the oppressed live in shame.
    No, let the poor and needy praise your name!

²²God, rise up! Make your case!
Remember how unbelieving fools insult you all day long.
²³Don’t forget the voices of your enemies,
the racket of your adversaries that never quits.

Footnotes

Psalm 74:1 Perhaps instruction
Psalm 74:5 Heb uncertain

Isaiah 26:16-27:1

Common English Bible

¹⁶Lord, in distress they sought you out;
    they poured out prayers to you when you disciplined them.
¹⁷As a pregnant woman close to childbirth is in labor pains,
    crying out in her pangs,
    so were we because of you, Lord.
¹⁸We were pregnant, we writhed,
but we gave birth to wind.
We have achieved no victories on earth;
    the inhabitants of the earth never fall.

¹⁹Your dead will live, their^[a] corpses will rise,
    and those who dwell in the dust will shout for joy.
Your shadow is a shadow of light,
    but you will bring down the ghosts into the underworld.
²⁰Go, my people, enter your rooms and shut your doors behind you.
    Take cover, for in a little while the fury will be over.
²¹Look! The Lord is going out from his place
    to bring the iniquity of the ruler of the earth down upon him.
The earth will uncover its blood
    and will conceal its slain no longer.

Scattered people return

27 On that day, the Lord will take a great sword, harsh and mighty, and will punish Leviathan the fleeing serpent, Leviathan the writhing serpent, and will kill the dragon that is in the sea.

Footnotes

Isaiah 26:19 Or my

Luke 11:14-28

Common English Bible

Controversy over Beelzebul

¹⁴Jesus was throwing out a demon that causes muteness. When the demon was gone, the man who couldn’t speak began to talk. The crowds were amazed. ¹⁵But some of them said, “He throws out demons with the authority of Beelzebul, the ruler of demons.” ¹⁶Others were testing him, seeking a sign from heaven.

¹⁷Because Jesus knew what they were thinking, he said to them, “Every kingdom involved in civil war becomes a wasteland, and a house torn apart by divisions will collapse. ¹⁸If Satan is at war with himself, how will his kingdom endure? I ask this because you say that I throw out demons by the authority of Beelzebul. ¹⁹If I throw out demons by the authority of Beelzebul, then by whose authority do your followers throw them out? Therefore, they will be your judges. ²⁰But if I throw out demons by the power^[a] of God, then God’s kingdom has already overtaken you. ²¹When a strong man, fully armed, guards his own palace, his possessions are secure. ²²But as soon as a stronger one attacks and overpowers him, the stronger one takes away the armor he had trusted and divides the stolen goods.

²³“Whoever isn’t with me is against me, and whoever doesn’t gather with me, scatters. ²⁴When an unclean spirit leaves a person, it wanders through dry places looking for a place to rest. But it doesn’t find any. Then it says, ‘I’ll go back to the house I left.’ ²⁵When it arrives, it finds the house cleaned up and decorated. ²⁶Then it goes and brings with it seven other spirits more evil than itself. They go in and make their home there. That person is worse off at the end than at the beginning.”